How to Transfer Your Focus

We must transfer this relationship with our idol (food, lusts, materialism, drugs, etc.) over to a relationship with God. You have to learn that every time your mind goes to your idol, you need to get it off and concentrate on higher callings.

Your idol is not your friend. Let us take extra food, for example, because all idols are alike… an idol is entertaining, it fills up time, and it is basically like having a relationship with another person. If you have ever had a crush on someone, then you know how this feels. You feel your emotions rise and your pulse rate go up when you think about the food. In a relationship with the food, you are now dressing for it—you are putting on your stretch clothes or PJs to make sure that nothing stops you from binge eating. You listen for its voice. You think about it in the morning, and you think about it at noon. You start reading about it and preparing for it, and the next thing you know, you have got this affair going on by the time it is ten o’clock at night when no one is there and no one is looking, and you can secretly be with that food.

But this food is not a friend! Excess food is a thief, a parasitic leech slowly sucking the life out of you. First, it robs you of your spiritual relationship with God. Then it robs you of your health, your energy, your sleep. It robs you of your time, your mind. And it robs you of your finances because it is expensive. It robs you of your relationships… it puts a wedge between you and other people; it puts a wedge between you and your spouse, and then it keeps you from playing with your children. It keeps you from cleaning up the house because you are too tired. You constantly have to go to the doctor, and you are trying to figure out what is wrong with you. And you just cannot remember when you were not either angry or depressed. So food is not a friend. It is a false comfort, it is a false help, it is a false god.

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